Many types of systems and mechanisms have been provided in the prior art in order prevent industrial doors, and more specifically multi-panel articulated overhead doors such as garage doors, to be damaged by inadvertent impacts from circulating vehicles.
However, those systems and mechanisms generally suffer from one or more of the following limitations and drawbacks. They can not be retrofitted to a standard existing door railing, and/or they do not enable impact compensation in both directions, and/or the releasable mechanism is complex and expensive and/or difficult to resume into normal operation after yielding.
It would therefore be a significant advance in the art of impact-resistant door systems to provide a breakaway door panel system which is releasable under inward or outward impact of a predetermined strength, is simple, low cost and easy to put back in service rapidly and without significant physical effort.